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sweep' through the southwestern Pacific would be“That was to stall them long enough to get Australia in a position to defend itself. As it happened, we did it,” Garrett said.The defenders learned quickly who had won the spoils of victory And they found only brutality at the hands of the conquerors.Beginning on April 10, 1942. thou sands of men, Americans and Filipinos, were forced to march for six days from Bataan to O’Donnell Prison Camp Many were sick or wounded and most had not eaten for days.They were given little water and food The men who collapsed were shot or bayoneted by Japanese clean up squads and their comrades learned quickly that it was dangerous to help themAlong the way, guards packed prisoners into pens designed for one-fourth their number Many had dysentery, and they and their comrades had to live in human waste infested with mag-Yet Crea and Garrett survived, as did hundreds of others “You’ve got to have faith in the diety. You’ve got to have stamina I was a trained soldier, Crea said.Garrett said as a 21-year-old Air Corpsman, he was in good shape He marched with four buddies, keeping toward thef the groups of prisoners and away from the sick and wounded to the rear where guards dealt harsher treatment their captives.the Japanese soldiers let them get close enough, residentsof villages threw food, often small cakes made of unrefined' sugar, to the prisoners.The survivors were collected at Camp O'Donnell and then assigned to other POW camps.Garrett went first to a camp in the middle of Luzon and then was sent to mine coal at Omuta on the Kyushu Island, the southernmost of the islands making up Japan Crea suffered from diseases malaria, scurvy, beriberi — andwended his camp-to-camp transfers in Manchuria “They didn’t get anything from us but a hard time, he said.He worked in a steel factory making machine parts “until it inadvertently burned down,’’ he saidAfter the fire, he was put to work in a tannery, making leather goods for Japanese soldiersForty years laterBrig. Gen. Richard Pierson shakes hands with Joseph Crea after pinning a Bronze Star on his chest last week at Tyndall Air Force Base.Herald Art SorterBut the tannery workers usedWblue vitriol to break down the leather, making it fall apart when it got wet The prisoners ate the corn meal mush the Japanese fed them, but added meat to their diets when they could catch some thing Crea said prisoners would save food for bait to lure dogs into the electrified fence around their compound Crea said the Japanese sentmedical teams into the camps to experiment with prisoners The medics would inject the captives with diseases to test anti toxins Although they were in Plt; W camps, the American and British prisoners knew what was happening with the war. Creasaid They could read between the lines of the newspaper Japanese printed, and they had help from the Chinese, Crea and a companion were sitting under a budding when they saw an old Chinese man killing lice in his clothes Crea s companion made a coin ment about how ugly the old man was He got an answer from the old man “This guy said J can’t help it in am English, Crea said The old man was a colonel in AirForce intelligence.“We used to call him Abraham Lincoln because he looked like Abraham Lincoln, Crea saidSince they kept up with the news, it came as no surprise to the prisoners when the Japanese finally were driven outWThey were kept in the camp for three weeks after the Russians came south into Manchuria While transportation was prepa red. a B - 29 bomber dropped supplies to the POW s.Crea at that time weighed only 89 pounds.On Kyushu, Garrett also knew something was happeningAround Aug 15, 1945, the prison ers were pulled out of the coal mines and given a three-day rest Then they were called into the compound of Camp 17 and told about the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, about 75 miles away.They were told that Japan was surrendering, but that guards would remain at the camp for the prisoners' safety. On Sept. 1, 1945, the guards, were gone.It was around .Sept. 3 that a Chicago Daily News war correspondent wandered into camp told the prisoners that U.S. troops were in JapanDavid Garrett, right, also was given the medal at the ceremony that included the retirement Lt. Col. Jimmy Rhodes, backaround.The American prisoners found a Chinese POW camp across town.They hadn’t been told then the war was over. They (the Japanese) were still working them We put a stop to that, GarrettGarrett and Crea were returned to the U S and hospitalizedGarrett stayed in the Air Force, leaving communications and going into supply by the time he retired as a chief master sergeant in 1970Crea was transferred to the Air Force in 1947 and finished hismilitary career as a security policeman, He was a staff sergeant when he retired in 1964Last week, the Air Force gave them their medals, due to the efforts of another retired sergeant who sought to have Air Force veterans of the PhilipBataan honored as Army veterans were a couple of* (TToday, Crea and Garrett live within about a mile of each other on opposite side of U.S. '98leading to TyndallGarrett said he went hack to Japan twice on Air Force duty. His wife, Kyoko, is Japanese.
Newspaper Details
Panama City News Herald
Panama City, Florida, US
Mon, Nov 04, 1985
Page 3
Full Page
Clipped by
Grace D.
USA 24 May 2022
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